The National Security Agency (NSA) is pleased to announce that the Applied Research Prototypes (ARP) program is moving to the Signals Intelligence Directorate (SID) to more closely support mission activities. The program is also being renamed the Innovative Mission Capabilities (IMC) program to reflect this increased emphasis on mission requirements. IMC will continue to focus on finding industry partners who can conduct original research into innovative technologies and strategies or conduct applied research into adapting and repurposing existing technologies in new or more effective, efficient or creative ways to meet NSA’s special requirements. Companies awarded short, fixed-price contracts under this program will develop functional research prototypes to demonstrate the applicability and effectiveness of new technologies to address NSA’s mission needs. The research topics to be addressed via the prototypes are expected to cover a wide range of technical areas including, but not limited to, Cyber Security, Watch Office Operations, Telecommunications, Information Assurance, Data Exploitation, Large Scale Analytics, Streaming Data Analytics, Visualization, Cloud Technologies, and many other areas of importance to NSA’s mission.

The market survey for the IMC program will soon be released by the ARC, so please watch for notices about the market survey. Companies interested in participating in IMC must respond to the market survey to be considered for inclusion in the program. All work done under this program will be unclassified and will be done in the company’s own facilities. IMC offers excellent opportunities for companies to work with NSA mission offices, develop insight into NSA’s unique requirements, potentially obtain sponsorship into the PISA program, and possibly obtain follow-on work for promising technologies.